


Let's Talk About Q

by ImagineDragonflys



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen, Happy Ending, If The Writers Won't Do It Then I Will, Julia and Q finally have a talk, Let Q Talk About His Feelings I Am Begging, M/M, angst-ish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-28
Updated: 2019-03-28
Packaged: 2019-12-25 17:30:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18266069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ImagineDragonflys/pseuds/ImagineDragonflys
Summary: Julia and Quentin finally have a talk about his worsening depression and his investment in their quest to save Eliot.





	Let's Talk About Q

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! This is my first ~real~ The Magicians fic inspired by the lack of attention Q's declining mental health has received thus far this season. (It's wish fulfillment for communication, basically).  
> Please, I just need someone to bring up Q's downward spiral.

“Q, we need to talk.”

Julia had walked straight up to him but he didn’t seem to notice her until she spoke. He startled slightly, looking up at her from his perch on the stairs with the same exhausted expression he always seemed to wear now.

“What’s up? Did something happen?” His voice was concerned but his expression remained neutral.

“No. Nothing happened. I just… We need to talk,” Julia sat down on the stairs next to him.

Quentin shifted awkwardly, looking down at the drink in his hands, “Oh. Uh- what about?”

“Q…” She took a deep breath, “I’m worried about you. _Really_ worried. I haven’t seen you this bad in a long time." 

He opened his mouth to respond. Probably to say he’s fine. They’d both have known it was a lie. Julia cut him off before he had the chance.

“I tried to give you space. I thought you would come to me if you needed help. But I’ve been watching you spiral down further and further…. I realized you’d end up hitting rock bottom before you asked for help.”

Quentin replied tiredly after a moment, “And what do you want me to do?”

“What?”

“What do you want me to do? To- to just break down and let it all out? I can’t do that. It will only make it worse and right now we need to focus if we’re going to have any chance of getting Eliot back.”

“I just want you to _talk_ _to me_. You can’t bottle it all up all the time. It’s like you're not even here lately.”

Q scrubbed a hand over his face but said nothing. 

Julia continued, “It’s like you don’t even care what happens to you. You almost let your arm get fucked up for a _doorknob_ . You almost let the monster kill you. You _would have_ let him kill you. But you don’t even seem to care! Just please _talk to me_. I want to help but I don’t know how.”

“You know how you can help? Help me get Eliot back.” There was anger in his voice as looked straight into Julia’s eyes.

“That’s not going to fix everything, Q. I know you’re worried about him, okay. I get that-”

Quentin cuts in, “No. You don’t get it. You don’t care about him. Not like I do.” 

“I… I know. I know that it’s different for you. But these feelings you’re having? It’s not just about him. They won’t just go away if you get him back. You know it’s never that simple. Just talk to me, please. You’ve barely said anything these past few weeks.”

Julia felt tears burning at her eyes. It felt as if Quentin was made of smoke and Julia was trying desperately to find anything solid in him to hold onto. Something she could use to ground him. His eyes softened as he looked back at her and she could see his mask start to crack.

“I wouldn’t even know where to start.”

Julia shifts slightly closer to him, “Just tell me what you’re feeling. When your sitting by yourself staring into space, where do you go?”

“I- I don’t really go anywhere? It’s like I can’t get myself to do anything else. I’m just here. Staring at a wall. And it’s- I- My brain is going like a million miles an hour all the time but it never does anything useful and-”

He paused for a moment as he fumbled over his words, keeping his eyes on the glass in his hand as he spoke.

“It’s like- Okay, um, it’s like everything I do- I’m underwater. Everything is muted and slow and heavy and all I can think about is how every minute we aren’t working- aren’t using to get him back? It’s like I’m drowning. Like it’s all a waste. But I have _no_ fucking clue what I’m doing or if what we’re doing is the right thing or if it’s even going to work.”

Quentin took a deep breath and spoke so low it was nearly silent, “Until Penny said he was alive… I thought I might have been wrong. Like the monster might’ve tricked me. I was so sure at first but then- I just- I started doubting it and it started eating at me. But now that I’m sure? I don’t know what to do, Jules.”

For a moment, she didn’t know how to respond. There was panic in his voice, the kind she’d heard when he was young and scared of the darkness clawing at his mind. Back then she would have held him and let him cry. Things were different now.

She took his empty hand into her own, “I never asked. How did you know it was really him? That day at the park, how did you know it wasn’t the monster.”

He squeezed her hand softly, still not looking at her.

“At first, I didn’t. I mean- The monster said he was dead. I thought it was just a trick… But what he said to me- that- the monster couldn’t know that.”

“Something about “proof of concept”, right?” Julia recalled, “What did that mean?”

Quentin stiffened, his finger tapped against the glass he held.

“It’s complicated.”

“Q, you can tell me.”

“No, I mean, it really is complicated.”

Julia released his hand and leaned back against the stairs. She gave him a soft smile when he glanced toward her, “Spill, Coldwater.”

She was scared briefly that he would close up, that maybe she’d pushed too far. But then he started to stutter out a response.

“Okay, so- Okay. You remember the third key? Me and Eliot went to Fillory and did the mosaic and died? So, that wasn’t really everything. Because- well, it didn’t really happen right? Except that we both remembered it. We didn’t tell anyone about it ‘cause the quest seemed way more important. But we both remembered and- in Fillory- we were _together_.  We had a life. A family. I- don’t look at me like that- there’s more.” He paused, took a quick drink from his glass before he raced through the next part, “When we got back. When we remembered. I asked him if we could be together. Here. I said we should give it a shot because we already knew they we worked. “Proof of concept”. He said no.”

Quentin set his glass down and turned to Julia. He looked cracked wide open, the tiredness of his entire being replaced by sorrow. She could see lines on his face that she hadn’t noticed before, the sullenness of his cheeks, the emptiness in his eyes looked much more like desperation now.

“We didn’t talk about it after that. None of it. I figured he just wanted to forget. So I let him.”

Julia nodded slowly, “So. You love him.”

It wasn’t a question.

“I-uh,” He scratched the back of his neck, “Yeah. I love him.”

“So at the park…”

“I don’t know what it means.”

Julia nudged him with her shoulder, “I have a few ideas.”

He nudged her back and she wiggled her eyebrows at him exaggeratedly. Quentin huffed out a small laugh, the first Julia had heard in months. It was soft, barely more than an exhale, but it felt like a victory. She wrapped her arm around his shoulder and pulled him into a hug.

“Q, I need you to keep talking to me. I want to help you, however I can. As much as I can.”

She pulled him closer, squeezing him tight. He didn’t say anything but he squeezed back.

As she pulled away she took his hand in hers once again, “You know what this means, right?”

Quentin’s eyebrows knit together, “What?”

“When we get Eliot back, I’m going to kick his ass.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! I'm kind of incapable of writing all-out angst. Leave comments or critiques if you'd like! My twitter is @sadgaytiefling if you want to follow :)


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